As some of you may remember, I agonised before my Antipodean trip as to whether or not I should conduct certain scientific experimentations whilst almost upside down. In brief, should we risk importing Brit Mars Bars and Marmite to check them against their Aussie counterparts?
As it turned out, we went with the Mars Bars but chickened (beefed, vegetarianed, whatevered) out of the Marmite v Vegemite debate. To be blunt, I did not personally feel that Vegemite was worth the necessary intellectual rigour.
Cruising into Sydney Airport, Mrs M completed her quarantine card to confirm that she was importing comestibles in the form of said Mars Bars. We were on tenterhooks about whether they would be allowed through and then the bastards lost my case. About an hour into waiting beside the carousel, this nice quarantine official ( her mother came from Inverkeithing) wandered up and asked us for our cards.
She asked about the comestibles. On being advised that they were Mars Bars and why we had them, she said that she did not know that there was any difference but that she would now have to take Aussie ones to her daughter in Milton Keynes when she went over next month. She signed off Mrs M’s card and our British Mars Bars were free to enter Oz without further let or hindrance.
In due course, we acquired some Aussie Mars Bars for comparison purposes.
In primo, they have different wrappings. In secundo, slightly different in weight and contents but not that much so it all had to come down to the taste test.
So, in tertio et denique, Mrs M and younger brother carried out said taste test. 2-0 to the Brit Mars Bar. Whilst acknowledging that the Aussie version (bottom) was slightly more crunchy in chocolate terms, they both said that the Brit one (top, of course) was the true and authentic version.
On the Vegemite, on our last morning in the Four Points Sheraton, Darling Harbour, Sydney, we decided to take a continental breakfast whilst waiting for our transfer to the airport. This is a blurred picture of my croissant and the accompanying proferred condiments.
Obviously, I decided against the Vegemite and went for the boring option of that great Jock invention, marmalade (only good thing to have come out of Dundee apart from the Tay Road Bridge and the great James Wolfe who I miss). I took the Vegemite and tried it on a piece of toast at my brother in law’s the next morning.
Still utterly bowfing even in its own native climes. Luckily, said brother in law had proper British Marmite to take away the taste.
Anyhow, when we got to Cairns, I chanced across this Ice Cream shop which sold Mars Bars ice cream.
In a fever of Jockish homesickness, I asked about the possibility of deep frying but it was not an option. So, I settled for one scoop of Mars Bar and one of Toblerone. Almost Embra!
Boadicea's Chariot 
Did you go on the Kuranda Railway from Cairns?. There is a Jockinese shop in the village at the end of the line! All sorts of Scottish goodies there, including bagpipes!
Yippee, what a wonderful post, Mr Mackie, not least because you actually admitted to your lack of intellectual rigour!
I shall of course, remind you of this for at least the next ten years. (huge smug smiley thingy)
“She signed off Mrs M’s card and our British Mars Bars were free to enter Oz without further let or hindrance.”.
I do not think I care to be entered by a Mars Bar of whatever origin, but just for the record I have jars of Marmite, Vegemite and Bovril in the cupboard.
OZ
Och, FEEG, it’s a fair cop. How could we walk past it with the strains of ‘Scotland the Brave’ belting out?
The original Jock owners retired and sold the shop to their former assistant who has absolutely no Jock connection but knew a good selling point when she saw it.
PS. Yes, I miss James Wolfe too!
Hi Oz. Major smiley thing and my apologies. I did. of course, mean the non-Continent country and not you.
Great post, Mr Mackie. 🙂
I don’t know if it applies to Mars bars, but our daughter and grandson assure us that a friend of theirs heard it from a school-friend who heard it on local radio last week that in Australia there is an extra ingredient added to all chocolate in order to raise its melting point. We are told that if you attempt a sticky finger experiment by grasping a Brit bar of choccy in one hand and its Aussie equivalent in the other, the Brit hand will become ucky way before the Aussie.
Hence the taste difference, the Aussie being “less smooth”.
Our juniors could have been winding us up, of course.
I think your children have been telling the truth. Here in SA, chocolate melts at a higher temperature than it does in the UK.
To James Wolfe:
Indeed there is, Bearsy. It’s called a hydrogenated lauric oil (normally coconut or palm kernel oils through which hydrogen gas has been bubbled) which gives a higher slip point (as opposed to melting point) to the end product. Hence your Aussie bar will stay solid on the shelf in Cairns or longer in the hand whereas the Brit version would indeed soon go ucky. The taste of neither is actually affected.
OZ
Wow! Thanks OZ.
I shall astonish them with this knowledge at our next family chatfest. 🙂
PS – they didn’t say the taste was affected, they said that the texture was different – I should have been more accurate in my original comment. 😦
Is that what they put in Treets, then?
Sipu – that’s a link to a Google page of piccies referring to JW’s historical namesake and ancestor, not an individual piccie.- hence no display.
Bravo – Absolutely. The ‘crisp candy coat’ is made with chocolate to which hydrogenated lauric oils have been added whereas the centre is normal chocolate. The science is very precise and the manufacturer can gauge the slip point of the coating to be slightly higher than the temperature of your hand but lower than the temperature of your mouth, hence the advertising slogan ‘melts in the mouth, not in the hand’. 🙂
OZ
Fascinating Oz, thanks for that – added to my stock of serendipitous facts for production at apporpriate moments in the bar 😀
As a former confectioner (York, not Slough) I can confirm the food technology revealed here. It is also possible that local preferences revealed in tasting panels have led to different recipes – witness the variety of Kit Kat versions available aorund Europe and the world.
Thanks, yes, I realised that after I had pasted the link. Never mind. I wonder what happened to JW.
Sipu – I have no facts available to me, but I have vague reasons to fear that the excellent James Wolfe may be deceased. I very much hope that I am wrong. Others may possibly have more information.
Bearsy, that is sad news if true. I enjoyed his contributions.
I could be very naughty here, but I won’t. Just think Mick Jagger!!
Jay Dubya?
Say it ain’t so.
Jay Em, you have his e-mail address, you two were playing chess/tiddlywinks/battleships and such via e-mail. Can you shed any light on this grim suspicion?
I only demand clarity on the grounds that my own demise was somewhat over-egged.
No, not that JW, Ferret. James Wolfe of Canada.
… and not Mick Jagger, FEEG. Marianne.
Me thinks that there’s some confusion here.
James Wolfe was over on MyT in the early days, a lawyer and resident of Vancouver, our member is The Royalist (Aka J W)
One and the same I thought Bearsy. Jay Dubya.
Yes, but what was Mick doing? I thought suggesting his name was the lesser of two evils 🙂
No Ferret – not the same person in any way, shape or form.
“JW” is J. Wilson, writes Gothic Stories at http://theroyalist10.wordpress.com/.
James Wolfe lives/lived on an island off the west coast of Canada.
Well whadya know?
Thanks for clearing that up Mr Bear. Funny how you just takestuff as read innit?
I still hope you are wrong about James Wolfe, he wuz a goodun’. 😦
I can tell you that Mars Bar differ the world over and the worst I have ever tasted were in South Africa in the 80’s – ‘yeurk’ doesn’t have enough disgust in it to describe the disappointment,
So bad I didn’t try again on our last trip 🙂